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Hayley’s Quick Detox Tips

It’s Monday (or in some cases, Tuesday) and you’re feeling gassy, bloated, and lethargic. The culprit? One too many cocktails, brownies, and dinners ending in utterly too full bellies over the weekend….right?

We’ve all been there, and I’ve just had one of those weekends full of refined carbs, dairy, sugar, and overall over indulgence. I’m not one to encourage total avoidance of those “naughty” foods like bread, sugar, and cheese but I do try to limit them. So, after a weekend full of unhealthy eating, my body is desperately craving a bit of cleansing. Luckily, I believe in the reset button, and you should too.

I don’t layout a step by step plan that you have to follow all week, I simply have a few favorite tips that I do for a day or two…or three… to reset and get my body back to feeling good, increase my energy, and set myself up to continue making healthy decisions. Try some of my Quick Detox Tips, either all or just some, and you’ll get your body back to feeling fresh, light, and healthy before you know it!

Drink Green Juice

Freshly juiced veggies and fruits are super cleansers! Whether you have a juicer and can do it yourself or you can stop at a place like O3 Café in Buffalo, get a hold of a juice that contains some greens first thing on your cleansing day. Fresh raw veggies are full of live enzymes that help clean out your cells and refuel your body. Juicing the fruits and veggies makes the enzymes super accessible and allows you to drink more because the super-filling fiber is removed (it’s okay, you’ll get your fiber elsewhere).

Consume Lots of Raw Fruits & Vegetables

It’s simple; raw fruits and vegetables have live enzymes, which not only help in the digestion process, but also help clean out your cells, remove toxins, and purify your body. When you’re craving a snack during your cleansing time, reach for an apple, celery, carrots, any raw fruit or veggie will do!

Eat a Raw Lunch

Keep on the clean path with a raw food  lunch. You can have veggies, nuts, sprouted grains, seeds, cold-pressed oils. Any large salad will do! If you’re a meat eater, you can go ahead and add a lean meat like chicken breast or fish but don’t add processed marinades or mayo and if you have a protein, don’t have any sprouted grains. The more veggies you eat, the more cleansing power you give your body, so fill that plate up with lettuce!

Eat a Clean Dinner

Similar to lunch, you want to keep your plate full of raw or lightly cooked veggies and keep the extra sauces/oils to a minimum. You can have some cooked food here, like rice or a lean meat but if you have one, don’t have the other. Eating rice? Keep it to raw or steamed veggies on top. Eating chicken? Skip the rice. Keeping your meal organized to contain either starch OR protein will help your digestive system efficiently process your healthy meal.

Avoid Salt, Coffee, Dairy, Sugar, Artificial Sweeteners, Alcohol, and Wheat

Like I said before, I’m not one to avoid the so-called ‘naughty’ foods, but when you’re trying to cleanse, you absolutely must say no for at least one day. I like to limit these foods as much as possible and on a day of cleansing, you will really feel the difference if you avoid salt, coffee, sugar, alcohol, dairy, and processed wheat (Sprouted grain bread is acceptable). Give it at least one day without these no-no foods, and then see how long you can go without a few of them. The longer you keep these foods out of your diet, the better your body will feel so go ahead and see if you can avoid these foods for more than a day.

Drink Lots of Water

You should always drink lots of water, but when you’re cleansing it is very important to flush toxins out with water. Drinking water at room temperature is better for your digestive system, and adding fresh lemon to your water will give it an even greater cleansing boost. Bottoms up!

Keep Your Portions Small

Give your digestive system a break, and only eat as much as you need to feel satisfied, not full. Eat slower to give your body time to process what you’re consuming and put the fork down before your plate is empty and really take a moment to check-in and see if you really need to eat more. It should only take your body 4 hours to get hungry again after a meal, but eating too much can challenge your digestive system, make digestion inefficient, and keep waste in your body too long (hello gas, indigestion, bloat, and discomfort)!

Only Eat When You’re Hungry

Similar to keeping portions small, eating only when you’re hungry will ensure that your digestive system isn’t over taxed and your energy levels stay high. Don’t make your body work super hard to digest extra food it doesn’t need. If you aren’t hungry, your body is still using energy to digest what you’ve fed it before, so feeding it more food will only tax your body, deplete your energy, and cause you to hold on to waste. Eat small portions and only when you’re hungry to keep everything running smoothly and help your body cleanse and replenish.

Get Plenty of Sleep!

Always get at least 7 hours a night. But really get at least 7 hours when you’re trying to cleanse. The more tired you are, the harder it is to make great, healthy decisions and the less energetic you will feel. You need rest to restore your energy and get your body for another successful day!

Have questions!? Feel free to email Hayley@betterbodybuffalo.com for personalized quick detox tips.

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Wellness Habit: Start the Day with Warm Lemon Water

Yes, I do drink my cleansing lemon water in a Bud Light glass.

Drinking water is the perfect way to start your day.  Believe it or not, simply being hydrated will help you feel fresh and awake and ready to conquer your day!  Add an extra boost to your morning water with lemon.  Lemon has some amazing benefits that you can reap simply by squeezing some organic lemon juice into lukewarm water each morning.  Here are just a few great things warm lemon water can do for you:

Aids Digestion

The lemon juice you squeeze in to your water will help you flush out toxins and promotes bile production, all of which helps maintain a healthy digestive system.   Lemon’s aid in your digestive system will help relieve indigestion, gas, and heart burn, too.

Promotes Weight Loss

Lemons contain a good amount of pectin fiber, which helps regulate hunger and keep you from eating unnecessarily. Lemon also helps balance for bodies pH levels.  A body with a balanced pH level is much more readily able to lose weight than one with a highly acidic pH level. Go lemon!

Boosts Immune System

Lemons are really high in vitamin C, they are a citrus fruit after all! You need high levels of vitamin C in your body to help it repair itself when nasty bugs and bacteria attack and lemon’s naturally high levels of potassium helps reduce free radicals and increase red blood cell production!

 Increases Energy

Hydrating with water alone will help you increase your energy, but adding lemon gives you even more oomph! Lemon actually creates an enzyme reaction during digestion that gives your body an extra dose of energy and simply smelling lemon boosts your mood.  It’s science.

 

Those are just four of the many reasons lemon water is a great addition to your daily habits. Even on the days that I don’t consume my lemon water first thing in the morning. I make sure to have it at some point during the day.  I honestly do love the way I feel when I drink lemon water first thing in the morning.  I squeeze ½-1 whole lemon into my water for ultimate results and, voila, I feel energized, fresh, and ready to make healthy choices throughout my day. I highly recommend holding on to this wellness habit forever!

P.s. I’m drinking mine right now, are you?

 

Be well.

 

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Buffalo’s Best Healthy Eats: Veggie Combo Platter at Pano’s

Greek restaurants can sometimes be a challenge for  vegan eaters.  Souvlakis aren’t quite the same without the chicken and the feta cheese, right?   Luckily for us Buffalo vegans, or even just Buffalonians looking for healthy meal alternatives, Pano’s provides a hearty and worthwhile option: the Veggie Combo Platter.

The Veggie Combo Platter from Pano’s makes a great lunch or dinner that is chock full of fiber, low in fat, and super delicious. The meal includes a large plate of hummus, grilled vegetables (mushrooms, zucchini, peppers), grilled northern beans–you have to get them grilled!–and a lemony spinach and rice mixture.  It is a hearty, substantial dish and, as you can tell, very carb-heavy.  The good news is if you sub raw veggies for the pita, which I always do, you can cut out most of the refined carbs and add an extra bit of nutrition to your meal. You’ll get vitamins and minerals from your veggies, and tons of fiber and protein from your beans and hummus; it is a perfect vegan dish!

I absolutely love the Veggie Combo Platter.  The grilled vegetables are always cooked perfectly, the hummus isn’t necessarily special but it is still very good, the rice is flavorful, and the grilled northern beans are one of my favorite things to eat in Buffalo!  With all of that healthy vegetarian protein, fiber, and flavor, you won’t miss the feta cheese or chicken souvlaki at all, I promise!  Plus, at just over $10, this meal is a bargain.  I always take home leftovers and unless I’m super hungry, I can make two meals out of the dish.

Next time you’re on Elmwood, stop at Pano’s and try the Veggie Combo Platter; you won’t be disappointed.

Be well.

 

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Wellness Habit: Eat Final Meal 3-4 Hours Before Bed

Last week I embarked on a journey to develop a good habit for wellness, eating no less than 3 or 4 hours before bed.  This may not be hard for some people, but for someone who regularly works until 8 or 9 p.m., it is a HUGE challenge.  Many personal trainers claim eating too close to bedtime deters weight loss efforts and I think they may be on to something.  Here are all of the benefits you can have when you stop eating right before bed:

Lose Weight

It may simply be because the later it is in the evening, the more likely it is that you’re reaching for ice cream or potato chips, but striving to stop eating 3-4 hours before bedtime has proven to be an effective way to lose weight.  If you eat junk all day but stop at the right time before bed, don’t expect results, but as part of a healthy diet and weight loss program, cutting out eating close to bed can help you reach your goal.

 

Get Better Sleep

Gas, indigestion, uncomfortable full feeling in your belly; all of those can seriously impede your ability to fall asleep and stay resting through the night.  Also, eating at night may also upset your body’s natural day/night cycle, impairing your sleep cycle and causing you to have trouble managing your blood sugar levels. These food-induced sleep disruptions could even lead to insulin resistance and diabetes. Try eating lighter at dinner and giving yourself at least 3 hours between your meal and hittin’ the hay to see if your sleep improves.

 

Feel Fresh in the Morning

There may not be any scientific reasoning, but when you go to bed with a full stomach you’re going to feel it in the morning.  Waking up feeling heavy and lethargic is not the best way to start your day and it can be hard to get a fresh start when you’re still feeling the effects of what you ate last night.  You may not think what you’re eating at 9:00 p.m. today will make a difference in how your day goes tomorrow, but it will; eat accordingly.

 

I must admit, it was very challenging for me to enforce this habit for myself for a week.  I often work until 8 or 9 at night and go to bed by 11 to get up at 5 a.m. That kind of schedule makes dinner time obsolete but on the days that I was able to eat earlier and give myself a nice break before going to bed, I really did feel lighter and more energized the next day.  I will continue to eat as far away from bed time as possible but when reality sets in, or I just get too hungry, I’ll make sure to reach for a light and healthy snack to avoid the heaviness and discomfort of eating late.

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